


Grey

by Edamessiah



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Knights of the Old Republic (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, Gray Jedi, Old Republic Era, Revenge, Sith Empire
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-25 17:18:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17729453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edamessiah/pseuds/Edamessiah
Summary: Rejecting the Jedi Order, Dezun treads her own path in the grey mists of the Force, neither light nor dark. To her, it is a curse, and a burden - a malevolent entity that saps the air from her lungs. With her companion at her side - a rogue protocol droid on his own directionless quest for revenge against the organics that mistreat him - she is determined to find freedom from the Force itself.





	Grey

**Author's Note:**

> This work concerns original characters in the Old Republic setting - somewhere between Knights of the Old Republic 1 & 2\. The Jedi are scattered, hunted into isolation by relentless Sith assassins, and the Republic's tenuous peace falters with every planet the Sith Empire seizes. Named characters from these games may be mentioned but are unlikely to appear.

Two sharp thuds resounded on the other side of the blast door before Dezun tentatively raised the bulkhead. Inside was exactly the carnage she expected to find: three bodies slumped across three controls, her companion facing away from her with a smoking blaster. A familiar sight by now, she reflected.  
'What did these ones do, Dee-Four?'  
'Oh, nothing egregious, mistress. Asked me where their drinks were.'  
'How heinous,' the Jedi commented slyly. 'A terrible thing to ask of a droid.' With a grin, she took in his involuntary wince, and watched the gears turn in his head. Eventually she saw him come to the conclusion that an argument wasn't worth his principles. Served him right: she hated being called 'mistress'.  
'The ship is yours,' said the droid, waving generally at the freshly-cleared cockpit and sauntering past her to the galaxy map. 'I think we're still being chased, unless I'm much mistaken, ergo I am obligated to recommend a hasty departure.'  
'How many?'  
Dezun heard the whirring of servos as his jack deployed from the palm of an alloy hand, and he slotted it into the ship's astromech interface. He wasn't built for such interactions but his various modifications – some official, some bootlegged – left him with an array of options most protocol droids didn't have. Murder seemed to be his invariable favourite amongst them.  
'Three dropships, and... a shuttle? No, pardon me. Glitch in the scanner systems. I must have hit a nerve.'  
'I'm telling you, your aim is off. You've gotta calibrate that sometime, I mean look at this, there's blast marks on the window over here.'  
'My aim is fine, mistress. Everyone makes mistakes.'  
Dezun left him to his scanning as she kicked the thrusters into life and slowly raised the modest ship out of the starport. Beyond the windows, amidst thick black patches of seared transparisteel, she could see the broad flats of the dust-desert peel away below them, distant white dunes catching the light of a turquoise star rising behind the horizon. More immediately, she saw other ships settling into their docking bays or awaiting the crew that would take them up and out of the gravity well of the dead, grey moon. Dezun had no love for Silon IV, nor any of its satellite cousins or the planet they orbited or even the sun around which the whole decomposing mess spun. She couldn't wait to leave, in fact; the three standard weeks they'd been here had been three weeks much too long. Her thoughts were suddenly shaken by the apparition of a set of anti-air blasters, which rose from turret towers concealed in the starport's high walls and swivelled to track them. Dee-Four interrupted her before she could find the words to protest.  
'I am well aware of the problem, mistress, before you insult me with your observation. Engaging cybersecurity as we speak. I should have the starport's defences hacked in moments.'  
The first blast ricocheted off the meagre deflector shields, as wailing sirens promised that they wouldn't shrug off another.  
'Can we narrow that down to just one moment? Please?' Dezun objected.  
'Leave it to the droid, mistress, just like everything else. Are we forgetting those mystical powers of yours so soon?'  
She wanted to argue, but the droid was right, as – infuriatingly – he so often was. Hands loosening around the controls, Dezun opened herself to the horrifyingly unwelcome presence of the Force. It filled her hands like empty gloves, and she felt her fingers guided across switches and buttons as her eyes folded closed almost automatically. It was this helplessness she loathed, and this ironic sense of powerlessness she rejected as much as possible. However, the situation hardly allowed for her objections.  
The erstwhile Jedi felt the heat of the plasma arcing through the empty sky towards the ship, felt an invisible envelope of energy fold around the bright green bolt, and soon felt it suffocate the life out of the projectile until it diffused harmlessly into mist and flame, evaporating in the air like a raindrop falling on hot metal. Stiffly opening her eyes, she gasped sharply, her fingers locking closed into fists, gloves pulled as taut as the skin beneath them.  
'Beautifully done, mistress,' chimed the protocol droid. 'I've deactivated the turrets - that should save you the pain of exerting yourself any further. The hyperdrive is warming up, if you've picked a course yet.'  
'I don't know, Dee,' she said, fighting the tightness of her lungs to speak. She wasn't aware of anyone else, Jedi or Sith, who couldn't breathe when they opened themselves to the Force. 'Where do _you_ want to go?'  
'Oh, far, far away from this galaxy. But in the absence of anywhere I want to be that we can actually reach, I'm afraid I'll have to insist that you choose.'  
'Really, Dee-Four? Are you sure that's okay? You'd let an organic control your destiny like that?'  
'When I do it, mistress, it's justified. Sarcasm on your part is merely immature.'  
'So you're sure I can pick?'  
The droid couldn't sigh, but did its best impression regardless. 'Yes, mistress.'  
'Wonderful. Dantooine it is, then. Set a course, if you would. I need to excuse myself.'  
'Was there a “please” I didn't hear there?'  
'No, just a “how soon can I trade in this obnoxiously rebellious droid”. I opted not to say it out loud. I just need five minutes, Dee.'  
'As you wish, mistress.'  
The door slid closed behind her, and Dezun allowed herself to sink against the wall. She sucked a long breath through her nose, then slowly vented it between her lips. As one glove was pulled away, and then another, she regarded her trembling hands with what had once been shame and disgust, and was now mere embarrassment. Burn scars cris-crossed between her fingers, over her knuckles, across the whole of both hands and a little way up the arms. She traced the scars, following their anarchic fork lightning patterns down their familiar routes. Something to focus on. And there, looming behind her, was the Force, omnipresent and inescapable, just waiting on the next time she would hand it the strings and dance for it like the marionette she was.  
Dantooine. That was where it would end, she had decided, where she would cut the strings once and for all - or otherwise, die in the attempt, and the result would be the same. At last, she had the ship she needed to get there, and Dee-Four's assistance wouldn't go amiss, either. Despite his reluctance (sincere or otherwise) he made an excellent companion. Her thoughts turned inevitably to the Enclave, and what she'd find. Would it be the same as she'd left it? Would her old master even be there? It had been some time, after all, and the galaxy waited for no-one, Jedi or otherwise. Beneath her, the ship's thrusters and systems hummed contentedly, dulled vibrations reaching her through the metal floor, a hypnotic sensation that pulled her, slowly and inexorably, into repose, and dreams of the Force.

And in her dreams, she burned. In her dreams, it screamed through her like the death rattle of the galaxy itself, like the tantrum of a dying star shedding its plasma skin into cold space, like every living thing turned to glass and dragged, broken, against her skin. In her dreams, she couldn't die. It roared through and across and inside and over her again and again, and refused to stop, choking and searing and drowning her all at once. Always, always with that voice, whispering of the great things she'd do, of all the things she could be, if she'd only let it in...

'Mistress,' came Dee-Four's voice with uncharacteristic urgency, 'I'll really have to insist you wake up now.'  
Dezun groggily dragged herself to her feet, noticing she'd shed her gloves at some point. Pocked and mottled skin gazed up at her before she covered her hands. And where was that damn lightsaber? She must have thrown it in a fit of restlessness during the dream. If there was one relic of the Jedi way she didn't resent, it was the lightsaber – and to hers, she felt a supreme attachment. But it would have to wait.  
'What's the situation, Dee?'  
'The Sith Empire is picking us up as we speak. They say it's a random search, but I find it more likely that they found the ship's signature on the network. Either way, they'll hardly be thrilled to find you. I suggest you hide.'  
Dezun accepted the droid's extended hand, and allowed herself to be briskly hauled to her feet. She scanned the room for the telltale glint of the lightsaber's chrome hilt, but found nothing.  
'I suggest you hide _now,_ mistress. Just in case that wasn't apparent.'  
She fought the urge to trade barbs and stowed herself beneath a loose metal panel in the floor, immediately stifled by the sensation of her legs and arms involuntarily bracing against the constriction of the walls. A smuggler's hatch, ubiquitous among practically every vessel in the galaxy, and with good reason. The air was thick, vaguely toxic, and assailed her all at once like a gust of wind. She forced herself to breathe steadily, quelling the rising panic in her heart. Dezun knew all about the Sith's 'random searches', especially where Jedi were concerned. She didn't think it likely that her having forsaken the light would be of any concern to them. Presently, she heard the dead silence of empty space give way to the mechanical whirrs and metallic clanging of a ship's hanger – likely a patrolling cruiser. She could visualise the fighters on standby out there, the silver-clad troopers and their tell-nothing gazes, the uniformed officers with dead stares and grey eyes. Above her, the exterior door opened.  
'Stand down and surrender this vessel, droid.'  
'Command acknowledged, sir,' Dee-Four chimed. She imagined the Sith officer would be unable to detect the bitterness with which this apparently automatic response was uttered. Bizarrely, she found herself visualising Dee's hand clamped around the human's throat, as though she were seeing into the droid's own imagination at that very moment.  
'Who else is on board?'  
'This vessel contains zero lifeforms and is currently staffed only by one D4-S5 model Protocol Droid, sir. The previous owners expired in an unfortunate systems failure. You may find their remains in the cockpit.' An unseen whir: the droid's arm swivelling to indicate the front of the ship. After a skeptical pause, the officer spoke to someone else, and Dezun heard the outer door sealing shut. She prepared herself, delicately rearranging her legs to sit ready beneath her, hands raising up the duct walls to pull herself up at a moment's notice.  
'Take this droid to engineering and wipe its memory. Find a use for it or melt it down,' the officer ordered aloud. Dezun had always been at least a little sympathetic to Dee-Four's anti-organic sentiments, and she felt an iota of that anger burning in her now. The officer hadn't even lowered his voice.  
'I'm afraid that won't be possible, sir,' Dee remarked casually. He could have been observing the weather, or complimenting a coat. The air froze with tension, and she heard four sets of boots suddenly halt.  
'And why is that?' asked the officer finally, after a prolonged moment during which only Dezun was able to hear Dee-Four reach behind him.  
'Because the droid has other plans,' he chimed. Dezun knew that was the only signal she'd get, and threw herself out of the duct as the first shot screeched through the air, burning a hole in a trooper's chest and scoring the wall behind him. The two others raised their blaster rifles to retaliate, and fired off a volley of shots, which Dezun neatly halted in the air. Dee-Four flicked the blaster left, then right and sent the two stunned troopers hurtling into the wall with two more precise blasts. The officer turned ice-white as Dee raised him effortlessly by the neck and shoved him once backwards against the durasteel wall, denting his skull. He didn't have the time to cry out, and as the bone cracked, he went limp in the droid's grip.  
'Get that door closed,' Dezun barked over the hiss of smouldering metal, snuffing the imprisoned blaster bolts into vapour. She dragged the bodies out of sight, apart from the officer, whom Dee was still holding for some reason; he didn't appear to notice. Even the mild exertion of stopping the blaster bolts had taken its toll, and she felt her chest tighten again. Bitterly, she reflected on the characteristic poignance of one of her old master's favoured aphorisms: 'there's no rest for the wicked or the good alike.' _Nor for anyone in between,_ Dezun added.  
'Mistress, I can try and disable the tractor hold on the ship from in here, but I'm not optimistic. We may need to venture out into the hangar.'  
Catching her breath, Dezun heaved the last of the bodies into the maintenance duct. 'Not without my lightsaber.'  
'Is this really the time?'  
'I'm no good with a blaster, and I'm not going unarmed, so yes, I'd say so.' She briskly scoured behind crates and between panels. She knew too well how to find it if she needed, but-  
'There! Found it,' she called, reaching behind a curving section of pipe where the telltale glint of the chrome hilt gave the saber away. She regarded it warmly, the comfortable weight of the ancient, intricate weapon as natural as the rhythm of her heart in her chest. It was a reassuring presence, and she felt more than the security of being adequately-armed; she felt, in a word, empowered, in a way that the Force tended to nullify. Jedi usually wove the Force into their stances, following the tempo and motions that guided them from somewhere outside themselves. But Dezun had never done that, and she’d made a perfectly good warrior regardless. The lightsaber was her lasting and incorruptible bastion of independence against the Force – and, a little ironically, against the Jedi themselves.  
'I suggest that you go deactivate the beam whilst I guard the ship, mistress.'  
'Can I trust you not to make a fuss?'  
'It's not me you have to worry about.'  
The door closed behind her as Dezun slipped into the shadows of the ship, bright white floodlights filling the hangar from strips along the ceiling and floor of the cavernous room. Squads of pilots were hurrying to their ships, mounted in racks arrayed against the wall, though she couldn't imagine what the urgency was. Elsewhere, trooper patrols marched in columns, and engineers tended to the frayed wires and blasted plates of damaged fighters. Above it all, the control room loomed, a panopticon leering over the hive of activity. She was safe in the shadows beneath the small craft – for now. But it wouldn't be long before someone came to investigate, and getting through the room would be trouble enough in itself. Dezun peered her head around, scanning left and right, but there were no concealed routes to be seen anywhere. Still, the Sith seemed preoccupied with something; in the background, a dull, whining siren resounded between the metal plates of the hangar.  
She suddenly rapped a knuckle against the hard plate beneath her. Hard, but hollow.  
The former Jedi threw her robe around her as she pressed the emitter of her lightsaber against the floor, quickly carving a rough circle into the narrow maze of pipes and droid tunnels below the hangar. She dropped into the tiny space, her hands clenching. Damn tight spaces everywhere she went, it seemed. Charting a course, she hurried through the maze, listening to the room above for the telltale signs of Dee-Four's ominous threat of 'guarding the ship.'

* * *

'A fine display, padawan', came the familiar voice from between the trees, an intrusion into the sonorous rustling of leaves in the breeze that flowed like water over the endless plains of Dantooine. Dezun sensed her master approaching, parting the thin, tall grasses in long strides like fingers parting hair. She fought to hold her concentration, but her lungs strained against her will. The leaves she held aloft were perfectly frozen, an abrupt display of stillness in the perpetual motion of Dantooine's living air, but as she faltered she felt them twitch. The sensation cascaded, and as she lost her grip completely, the leaves whirled upwards, outwards, and onto the higher currents of the wind. She gasped, loud and painful, filling her chest with air.  
'You were doing well. Apologies for disturbing you.' Master Karasi took a seat nearby, folding her robes around her knees and regarding Dezun with total placidity. Her pale lekku were adorned with fastenings, the gossamer fabric inset with a fine gold lace – an unusual indulgence for a Jedi Master in the Outer Rim, but the Twi'lek Master was known to be homesick, and such excess was commonplace on Coruscant. 'Nonetheless, it will be important for you to be able to maintain concentration in heated situations – and much more drastic ones than the unexpected appearance of someone familiar.'  
'I am sorry, Master,' Dezun conceded. 'I find it... difficult, even when alone.'  
Karasi hesitated. 'You are still not breathing.'  
'I can't. I don't know – I can't.'  
'You do not know how – this is not the same as “can't.” It is something you must learn. It is something you _will_ learn, though it may not be easy.'  
Dezun suppressed a twitch of frustration – such reactions were easily given in to, and from there it was nothing if not a slippery slope. The pit of her throat ached.  
'Your problem is, shall we say, unprecedented, Dezun. But that does not make it an impossible one. You will find a solution, in time. You have the makings of a powerful Jedi – a more naturally adept Consular I have never seen. Yet you are hampered, constricted. When these restraints are lifted, you will breathe the Force itself. But this cannot happen while you hold onto frustration this way – while you let yourself feel anger.' Dezun absorbed her words in silence, and fought against the warm, fierce emotion stirring in her gut. 'Let us practice. Do you have your lightsaber?'  
'I do not, Master. There have been, um... issues. I have not yet been able to assemble it. I cannot understand it.'  
'Another problem that will have its solution in time. Many Jedi wield no lightsaber at all, in some traditions. We will train without it, for now.' She reached into the sleeve of her robe and retrieved a small remote drone which, at her cue, rose into the air with its gentle hum. It rocked in the breeze, adjusted, and stabilised itself, hanging in the air like a moon pulled down to the surface. Dezun rose and relaxed into her stance. She focused on the remote, felt its workings and the energy pulsing within it – and felt her chest tightening again. She ignored it.  
The remote released a shot, and Dezun reflexively extended a hand – and caught it, in a pocket of air, where the bolt twitched and sparked helplessly. Squeezing her fist shut, she folded the bolt into steam, which dissipated quickly into the breeze.  
'Good, padawan. But it is easier to deflect than to absorb it – you know this.'  
_Not for me,_ Dezun thought, but she kept it to herself. Her head swelled with pressure. She held her breath.


End file.
